Author: DALSTON, LONDON
Title: A Valuable Archive containing a series of maps and documents charting the development of a particular London Estate.
Description: Manuscript and Printed, 1818 - 1917. The archive comprises> 1. A manuscript plan "shewing the lines of the intended new Roads from Hackney Road in the parish of St. Leonards Shoreditch to Dalston Lane in the Parish of St John at Hackney in the County of Middlesex." 1818. Drawn by Richard Dent. 445 x 335 mm. 2. Lithograph Plan of the Beauvoir Estate, including the Tyssen and Rhodes' Estate. Probably c.1823 due to a dispute between de Beauvoir and Rhodes. In 1821 speculative builder William Rhodes secured a building lease for 150 acres of land from the Reverend Peter de Beauvoir from Essex. In 1823 Richard Benyon de Beauvoir, a distant relative, managed to halt all building activity and by 1824 had regained control of most of the estate. 550 x 445 mm. 3. Plan of Dalston Estate, November 1863. Lithograph plan in two parts, worn. It is apparent from this plan that William Rhodes expansionist ambitions had been hardly constrained by the loss of the Beauvoir Estate. 385 x 300 mm. 4. Plan of Dalston Estate. C.1870. William Dickes Farringdon Rd. Lithograph plan showing the expansion of the estate, each house numbered, each street named. 660 x 480 mm. 5. Dalston Estate of the Revd. F.W. Rhodes. Decd. Plan as at January 1st 1917. William Reeve Surveyor. Francis William Rhodes was born in Hackney in 1807, the eldest son of William Rhodes. When William Rhodes died in 1843 the Dalston estate was divided up between Francis William Rhodes and his brother William Arthur. The Reverend Francis William Rhodes was the father of Cecil Rhodes, mining magnate and founder of Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe. 580 x 470 mm. 6. Manuscript accounts of the Dalston Estate. Rental & Valuation of the Lamb Farm or Dalston Estate November 1853. Rental Dalston Estate 1st January 1856. Dalston Estate Statement of the No. of houses on the Estate. 17 Oct 1865. 7. Deed of Partition of the Lamb Farm Estate Dalston in the Parish of St. John at Hackney Middlesex. 26th December 1874 + Supplementary Deed of Partition. The Rev. F.W. Rhodes and Thos. Wm. Rhodes. Lamb Farm occupied 140 acres between Dalston Lane in the north, Middleton Rd and Albion Rd in the south, Kingsland Rd to the west and London Fields to the east. In November 1789 the Tyssen family, Hackney's largest landowners, sold Lamb Farm to Samuel Rhodes, a farmer, but also a member of a family of "enterprising lessees" and "London brickmakers." Development for housing began as a ribbon development along Dalston Lane but expanded into estate development from 1821. Through an astute combination of speculative building and the granting of leases William Rhodes began the process of developing an estate which would provide the foundation of the Rhodes' family fortune. Richard Road was the first to cross the entire estate, following an old farm footpath. Queensbridge Road was finished in 1839. An 1848 valuation showed that 742 houses, occupying 60% of the Farm had been completed. 24 acres were originally laid out for market gardening and in 1858 Edward Wood is recorded as still cultivating 24 acres and employing four men. By the mid 1870's however the estate had been covered with a network of house lined streets and the transformation from fields to streets, which had taken some seven decades, was complete. Like most such enterprises in London speculative building allowed the landowner to lease land to a developer, enabling the landowner to both increase the value of the estate and at the same time to ensure a steady stream of income from the ground rents. The coherence of the architectural styles seen throughout the Dalston Estate suggests close supervision by the Rhodes family as well as the use of pattern books. The only non-domestic buildings were a public house, 3 churches and a school in Woodland Street, seen by some developers as "injuriously affecting their houses", since children of the intended middle-class clientele would have been expected to educate their children privately at home. An indication of the intended tenants can be seen in an early directory, The first residents of Richmond Terrace listed as "...>a newspaper editor, a bricklayer, a governess, four merchants and a gentleman chorister." As a family the Rhodes can be seen to have taken "diligent advantage of the available and commercial opportunities of their eras." Under their careful stewardship, eschewing the many perils of speculative development, Rhodes town prospered and today can be seen as their legacy> long wide streets with attractive houses, pleasing in their overall conformity of style, yet still distinct in their variety of detail.

Keywords: Maps


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